


January 1982

by aryastark_valarmorghulis



Series: Glimpses [1]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Canon Compliant, Lost Years, M/M, POV Remus Lupin, Post-First War with Voldemort, free writing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-01
Updated: 2018-09-01
Packaged: 2019-10-25 05:10:05
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 770
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17718677
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aryastark_valarmorghulis/pseuds/aryastark_valarmorghulis
Summary: Remus Lupin, 1982.





	January 1982

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Ginny_Potter](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ginny_Potter/gifts).



> Thanks to [ethereal_xo](https://www.archiveofourown.org/users/ethereal_xo) for being such a quick, lovely beta!

 

It's late.

Frail rays spill through the rattling shutters, a yellow flare pressing inside his closed eyelids.

Remus turns to the other side and pulls the duvet over his head to block the new day and burrow in the hot darkness of his bed, even if the wool is itchy against his cheek. Soon the warmth will become suffocating. His palms and armpits already sweaty, his unwashed hair sticking to his forehead, he smells perspiration and smoke and, like a lingering aftertaste, more in his imagination than in his bed, the smell of semen. He didn't change the sheets two nights ago after that men had left, but he  _did_ cast a Scourgify charm. It doesn't matter. His whole flat reeks of foul air, spilt Firewhisky and despair.

Remus burrows in the bed, willing the light to go away, the whole day to end, because at least if it's dark he feels justified to hide in his nest of covers. He wonders if this is the way he'll endure life, waiting for it to end, existing in the spare moments between sleep and wakefulness when, still numb from dreams, his brain lies and convinces him it's still before, and his heart, for a split happy second, believes him.

The wishful dream goes on, but it turns sour like it's been poisoned.

Sometimes he pretends to sleep, and from his bed, he tastes the cold screeching wood-planks under his socked feet, the chipped cup of tea gone cold on the three-legged table, and Sirius slouched on their ugly couch. Remus can conjure up his image any time he wants and also any time he doesn't, like Sirius is a malevolent ghost, haunting him. Dark hair long and unbrushed, handsome even pale and grim and nails-bitten, his lovely mouth a severe flat line, clad in that gray fuzzy housecoat that now hangs limp in his closet.

As long as Remus hides in bed, Sirius is still there, elbow propped on the faded, cracked leather armrest, quill and parchment in his hands.  _For Prongs, he's bored_ , he used to say – to lie – the bastard. Maybe he was writing to his Death Eater friends, or to his dead brother, or to all the thousand bloody lovers he ought to have had, to arrange meetings in some dark alley, fucking them all at the same time and loving none.

Remus presses his nose to his pillow, pretends to be young again, to bask in the smell of sweat and come and them that soaked their sheets.  _I want my twenties back_ , he thinks, _I want my youth back, I want the Sirius that never existed back. I want to feast on sweet lies and not choke on bitter truths._

His rational brain is still there, though, suggesting him to go buy a Muggle paper and read the job section: someone might need a dishwasher.

Nothing is worth the drudgery of leaving the bed, but he knows he'll cave, maybe in the late afternoon, if only to buy cigarettes and booze, or to pick up someone desperate enough to spend the night with him.

Out there right now, people, muggles or wizards, are fixing lunch, chatting about soccer or Quidditch, or working, he reckons. Old men could play cards or chess, children would dream about Hogwarts, young boys and girls would kiss on doorsteps or behind the greenhouses.

Remus has no job, no friends, no alcohol left to drink, only canned beans to eat. Such mundane tasks, eating, drinking, working, showering, walking: his back hunches but he doesn't break and fall under their weight like he's an Atlas carrying the burden to survive, like he's ivy climbing up a ruined wall, his vital lymph is stubbornly clinging to his tired body.

He'll get out of bed and Sirius won't be there in the kitchen with his lies and his kisses and his silences – only his ghost will follow Remus' steps like a shadow, a figment of his knife-sharp smile lingering between him and every person he'll let in his bed. He'll make tea and pour three spoonfuls of sugar the way Peter likes, and then he'll go outside in the bitter January cold, shoes sliding on the wet cobblestones, glimpsing spectres in every pretty girl with red hair, in every black tuft of hair sticking out from a wool cap.

He'll go outside and get a job and lose it and get another, and he'll get wasted and then sober again and he'll kiss strangers with his eyes closed and life will flow like a rushing river gathering debris and Remus will still be there, going.

  
  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> Come say hi on [Tumblr](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/aryastark-valarmorghulis)!


End file.
